Efficiency & Emissions on EPA Stoves (Englander 30 and Heatilator Eco-Choice 22)

I sure wish I would have seen this thread before I made my first stove decision. But in the end BrowningBAR set me straight and I reconsidered. The whole rating system is arbitrary. ALL OF IT. The truth is in the firebox size. It's measurable, it's factual, it's verifiable. All that's left is the cat/non-cat and also stone/steel debate which is just as political (or mere preference).

This is a great site and acts on the good intent of it's members. One can spend hundreds or thousands on their stoves and if he/she just spends a few nights on this forum a lot of questions can come up and answers are found somewhere from experienced users. It makes the difference between money invested or money wasted.

Thanks guys!

Agreed, but I read this and several other threads here on this Forum before buying an Englander, and I got it at a heck of a discount (also becasue of reading this Forum). All these efficiency and emissions and EPA numbers though... they seem to be all cooked up with variations in testing methods, specify some unpublished testing data or accepted lowest common denominator EPA numbers which are likely lower than actuals, but it would cost way too much to test and otherwise specify.

Which reminds me of the turbo entabulator. Now if you have never seen this, you are in for a really good laugh:

StihlHead said:

Agreed, but I read this and several other threads here on this Forum before buying an Englander, and I got it at a heck of a discount (also becasue of reading this Forum). All these efficiency and emissions and EPA numbers though... they seem to be all cooked up with variations in testing methods, specify some unpublished testing data or accepted lowest common denominator EPA numbers which are likely lower than actuals, but it would cost way too much to test and otherwise specify.

Which reminds me of the turbo entabulator. Now if you have never seen this, you are in for a really good laugh:

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What a hoot!. It explains exactly what I was trying to say on this thread:
https://www.hearth.com/talk/threads/the-mechanics-of-fishtailing.83956/page-3#post-1103455

Do you mind posting it there so the myth of trailer fishtailing can be explained? It'll drive home the point, who cares why? Just do it this way!

Now we know why engineers just aren't up for public speaking.

Done. I am an engineer too...

StihlHead said:

Done. I am an engineer too...

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If folks understood what we WANTED to say... well lets just say it wouldn't be good.

Is it really more efficient to run small loads instead of big ones, as someone stated earlier in the thread?

I believe that with any wood burning appliance, you are going to burn more efficinetly with smaller loads than with larger ones. I have experienced that with my OWB and all the wood stoves and inserts I have had (pre and post EPA). Loading them chalk full tends to get them making more charcoal and giving off unburned gasses, even with secondary burner systems. For that reason I tend to load my stove several times a day with one or two logs, rather than jam it all in there and letting it cook. At night before bed I tend to put in a big fat log or two, depending on the temps and let that burn to coals by morning. With a Russian Fireplace, what you do is burn a smaller fire really hot and fast and trap the heat in the mass of masonry and damp it down when the fire dies down. The brick acts as a heat sink and radiates heat for a long time. Similar to most wood gas burning systems with a water tank; burn a hot fire fast and heat up water that radiates the heat over time.

StihlHead said:

With a Russian Fireplace, what you do is burn a smaller fire really hot and fast and trap the heat in the mass of masonry and damp it down when the fire dies down.

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One thing I've never understood, maybe you can explain, is how the draft works with the Russian stoves. They have such complicated air channels that it just seems hard to believe that they draft normally.

Armoured said:

One thing I've never understood, maybe you can explain, is how the draft works with the Russian stoves. They have such complicated air channels that it just seems hard to believe that they draft normally.

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They draft pretty much the same as any wood appliance (natural air convection, hot air rises). If they are built right they channel the smoke/heat back and forth though several horizontal runs of brick before the smoke exits. Typically there is little smoke from a smaller hotter fire, and by the time the gasses exit the cap there is little heat left. Many claim that they are prone to creosote buildup, but that is not the case with a well bult one. They are rather massive, and lots of brick goes into them. I have a friend that built one into his house down by Crater Lake, Oregon, and he sells a CD (for cheap) that has several designs of Russian fireplaces on it. He claims to burn 1/3 the wood that he did in a smoke dragon stove. They work great if you have the room and a foundation to support them. You need a house that is designed to take advantage of the radiant heat as well. His house is a bungalow floorplan and he ran the fireplace own the middle and the rooms in the house are exposed to the brick walls. In the living room he has a bench made out of bricks to sit on and warm up rapidly with radiant heat. I am a huge fam of radiant heat after living for 4 years with a hydronic floor heating system. Better than forced air heating by far.

Here is one simple diagram of a Russian or Siberian fireplace, Swedish Stove or masonry heater design. However this has multiple channels and is not as efficient in my view. My friend Stanley has one that has the fireplace in the lower left corner, and the smoke has one path back and forth from end to end looping up to the top (like a snake).

StihlHead said:

They are rather massive, and lots of brick goes into them. ... You need a house that is designed to take advantage of the radiant heat as well.

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Thanks. I've seen a lot of them, but never fired one myself.

As for the construction, I'd say that for the most part the house almost has to be designed around the Russian stoves, and not the other way around. I'm sure it's possible to slam one into some house designs, but reinforcing an existing house to hold one and the rooms around it in a lot of cases would be close to a teardown.

Yes, those are the main arguments against them. They are massive, require high skill in masonry, they can be rather expensive, and they require a home designed around them to be effective, or a limited type of pre-existing home design to be built in as a retrofit. Open floorplan bungalow design homes work well with them, sprawling ranch homes with halls and lots of doors do not. We used to go to a ski cabin in Miwuk Village in California that my friend owned. It was built by a mason, and the fireplace was a massive one built of stone in the center of the two story house. The kitchen/family room was on one side and the living room on the other on the first floor. The upstairs bedwooms were all exposed to some part of the massive chimney. There were also vertical air slots built with stones on many of the exposed areas, which are also common in large stone and brick friepalces in homes that I have seen or rented in the Lake Tahoe area. It was a passive heating design, all run by convection. Those fireplaces tend to be continual open burn designs though, whereas a Russian/Swedish model burns smaller closed fires hot and fast a few times a day.

This is a point that's often bugged me. Now, my parents bought their insert
during the glory days of The Carter Years, when they proved that helicopters
can't really fly, and they had one that featured a fire box much larger than what
we now have. It was a "full" insert, so to speak, in that it completely filled the
cavity of the fireplace. Dunno the make, but that sucker got the living room up
to 72°F in the dead of winter in less than an hour. We have to burn ours for hours
to get those results. So I've always wondered if the EPA ruling on emissions choked
the efficiency of stoves. I do know it put some companies OOB 'cuz they could never
achieve the results Unca Sam was looking for.

Oh look, I ended a sentence with a preposition. My bad.

Otis B Driftwood said:

This is a point that's often bugged me. Now, my parents bought their insert
during the glory days of The Carter Years, when they proved that helicopters
can't really fly, and they had one that featured a fire box much larger than what
we now have. It was a "full" insert, so to speak, in that it completely filled the
cavity of the fireplace. Dunno the make, but that sucker got the living room up
to 72°F in the dead of winter in less than an hour. We have to burn ours for hours
to get those results. So I've always wondered if the EPA ruling on emissions choked
the efficiency of stoves. I do know it put some companies OOB 'cuz they could never
achieve the results Unca Sam was looking for.

Oh look, I ended a sentence with a preposition. My bad.

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Question . . . and it could be a dumb one . . . once you bring your insert up to temp do you start to cut back on the air to achieve a secondary burn or if it is a cat, do you flip it over to engage the cat. With my stove if I left the air control wide open I get a lot of flames and some heat . . . but if I cut back the air control once it is up to temp then the real magic begins with spectacular secondary burns and a whole lot of heat . . . it's as if the Bowels to Hell have opened up in my Jotul.

Jake: No question is a dumb question. However, I have plenty of snappy dumb answers
to perfectly good questions. Caveat: I'm a log throwing-type burner, in that I don't get real
technical with this stuff. That takes the fun out of it. But, like the rest of us, I do choke the
flame once it's been established awhile. Ascertaining what is "established" is a bit of art,
'cuz it depends on wood quality and ambient conditions.

I've found that with the Travis Rainier, a burn lasts around seven hours, with a mix of ash
and maple, mostly ash. It's not a cat stove. I hate cats. The only thing that cats are good
for are kicking and throwing at your neighbor. I have read they're a pain to clean though.
Have you ever tried to get a cat in water?

Our main problem here is that the geniuses that built our street back in The '60s apparently
didn't believe in insulation. Central CT?!? We weren't the only ones who bought here and
discovered this after the fact. So the leftover Roxul® I bought for my block plate project
will be put to good use. If I ever get my paws on the rat bastids who built this shoebox ...